


After the First Call

by ArgylePirateWD



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Autumn, Demon Hunters, Demons, Gen, Horror, Nighttime, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2020-12-23 23:51:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21089885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArgylePirateWD/pseuds/ArgylePirateWD
Summary: Soon as he gets out of here—if he does—he's calling up Glasses and asking the guy to fund his early retirement.Lionel has another second job.





	After the First Call

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wafflelate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wafflelate/gifts).

You learn a lot about your future as a cop that first call you go on when it's a full moon, Lionel found. If you're unlucky, that is. If you're lucky, you learn diddly squat. You run into a few mundane weirdos, and that's it. Another night in New York City. Big whoop.

If you're unlucky, well. Sorry for your life. You find out that the world is _weird,_ even when it's not a full moon, and you're one of the unlucky fucks who can see that weirdness and gets to face it head-on. Lionel's first full moon call? God. Lionel's first call told him he was probably the unluckiest fuck in the whole NYPD.

It's only gotten worse since.

This was supposed to be his weekend with Lee, their pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving, since the ex gets him next week. Instead his boy's home with a sitter, and Lionel's out here, freezing his ass off, yelling Latin at something bigger than him again. The ugly—what the hell is this thing? Something big and taxicab yellow Lionel decides to call a demon for lack of any better word. It stinks like a demon, that cross between sulfur and corpses you never forget once you've smelled it. Yeah, probably a demon.

The demon _roars_, so loud it shakes the earth and rattles Lionel's brain and sets off someone's car alarm. Lionel flinches, but he doesn't stop chanting.

The poor kid who called him out here after his partner fucked off, though? He lets out a scream he'd get endless shit for under any other circumstances and faints dead away. Or, at least, Lionel hopes the unlucky bastard just fainted. He can't stop and check. If he stops chanting, then he's gonna be a goner, and so is the rookie and a whole lot of other people, too, probably. And, damn it all, he doesn't want to go out like that—not killed by some giant, yellow _thing_ with shiny chrome hubcaps for eyes and big, spiky silver horns that was pretending to be a freakin' taxi thirty minutes ago and would look ridiculous if it wasn't trying to kill him.

The demon turns its attention on him, and Lionel chants louder. It starts walking toward him, its steps thunderous, each one crushing the pavement beneath its rubbery black feet into dust, leaving deep indentations in its wake. Lionel stares it down, standing as tall and broad and immovable as his short and bulky little body allows—god, he feels so small. But the second you show these things you're scared shitless, you've lost. And he ain't doing that.

Except he's pretty sure he's already lost this time. Jeez, this thing is _huge_, its massive yellow body nearly filling the alley, towering almost to the top, its limbs barely brushing the sides. Lionel yells the incantation, practically screaming all the old Latin he doesn't really understand beyond _"It works. Don't question it."_ until his throat burns like whatever hellfire this thing crawled out of.

Why can't he be known for something else, he thinks. Why can't he be the one guy in the whole damn NYPD who's not a supernatural magnet, or who's the absolute worst at banishing spooky shit? He wants to be home with his kid, not staring down his death and trying to beat it off with a bunch of words. God. Carter doesn't have to deal with this crap. Why can't he be more like her?

Soon as he gets out of here—if he does—he's calling up Glasses and asking the guy to fund his early retirement. Might even get on his knees and do a little begging. At least Finch and Wonderboy don't act like they believe in ghosts or send him out after taxi demons for shit pay. Just humans. He'll gladly take humans.

Lionel reaches the end of the incantation, and the damn thing's still not dead. Holy water didn't faze it. It ate the silver cross he flung at it, tossing the shiny and goddamn expensive thing in the air and chomping it down like a piece of popcorn. He's all out of moves, and he's got nowhere to go. There's a big chain link fence at his back that he'd never get over in time, and the thing at his front could tear it up like a piece of tissue paper anyway.

All that's left is his gun. Not once has it worked against a demon. Never. Still, he draws his sidearm, and as the demon gets close enough to take him down, he fires—right square in the chest. Best shot he's ever made. Reese and Shaw would be proud.

The demon's hubcap eyes go wide with shock. Then, a fraction of a second later, it explodes, showering him in warm yellow slime that stinks like rotten eggs and death. The bullet falls to the ground with an anticlimactic clink. Something lands in his hair and gets stuck in it. He thinks it might be that cross.

For a while, Lionel stands still, frozen and stunned. Then everything starts to creep back in—the stink engulfing his body, the sticky gunk covering him from head to toe, the November air quickly turning it from warm to cold. The sounds of the city, honking horns and distant sirens and oblivious—safe—people. That damn car alarm. His own ragged breathing. His heart. It's still beating.

Poor Officer Babyface, too, who's sitting up and staring at him, eyes wide, mouth gaping, somehow unsoaked even though he should've been blasted, too. "That...what the hell was that?"

Oh, man, this kid's got one hell of a career ahead of him. Lionel kind of wants to apologize.

"Not your problem yet, buddy," he says instead, eying the goop with disgust. "Ah, jeez." It's gonna take forever to clean the mess up.

But he's alive, and the rookie's alive, and the rookie's piece of shit partner's probably alive out there somewhere. And the ugly demon thing is not. He'll take it. And, hell, he might not turn in his badge and call Finch, either. Maybe.

It's way past time to demand that raise, though.


End file.
